Research

Researchers Prof. WANG Liping and Prof. TU Jie, at Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (hereinafter referred to as SIAT), collaborating with researchers at City University of Hong Kong, recently discovered a new role of astrocytes in one of the basic cognitive functions, decision making. Their findings, published in Cell Reports, could lead to the new insights into the functions of neuroglia cells in the cognition behaviour.

The research team led by Prof. LI Ying at City University of Hong Kong provided an elegant cognition measurement model, gambling test. Based on this model, they demonstrated that impairment of decision making is associated with suppressed synchronization in basolateral amygdala (BLA) - the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) network in the chronic pain rat models. Prof. WANG Liping's team at SIAT was a pioneer group of optogentics in China. Therefore, through joint tackling, they found that the repairing effct of ‘astrocyte-neuronal L-lactate shuttle’ on the impaired cognitive function: optogenetic activation of ACC astrocytes triggers local lactate release which contributes to the rescue of BLA-ACC synchrony and decision-making performance in chronic pain rats.

Their findings proposed a new model for linking the basic neural cells metabolism function and advanced cognitive function. Also, their findings provide new insights into cognitive and pain treatment in clinical chronic pain management.